Reflect,
refract,
and shatter
yesterday’s
delusions,
the distractions
that delay progress
toward love entire.
Reflect,
refract,
and scatter
light and love,
boundless and
unfettered.
— C.Birde, 12/17
Refract — An Image
Tuck Me In — A Poem
Tuck me in to sleep and dream,
away, out of the way, deep in
green-souled memory ticking
with the patter of small claws,
insects’ wings’ clatter, the rill
and trill of rain and breeze and
bird song, in warmth, in safety,
tuck me in embrace until the
deep dark fold of Winter has
passed.
— C.Birde, 12/17
Saturation — An Image
May we
invite Love to
saturate all we do;
to light our way when we stumble,
stray.
— C.Birde, 12/17
Sated — A Poem
Dark
chews,
gnaws,
swallows day,
minute by hour,
bit by
bit by
bite,
and, in so doing,
clears the path
for Winter,
marks a
return
to light.
— C.Birde, 12/17
Messages — An Image
Never forget
to take the time
to read those notes
tucked amongst the trees,
carried along the air’s current,
laid
— gently, sweetly —
at your feet.
— C.Birde, 12/17
Arrivals — A Poem
The
long stride
of Winter
finds us huddled
together —
bones shrunk within
too-thin flesh —
unimpressed
by prompt
and timely
arrivals.
— C.Birde, 12/17
Cetaceous Sleep — A Dream
Constricted view, consumed by clear blue sea, purled in white wavelets. Beneath that glittering, glassy surface rests a great, moon-pale shape, its smooth contours distorted by distance, by the sea’s subtle, internal motion. A whale. See the massive, blunt curve of head, dimpled by sealed blowhole; the sleek, muscled immensity of its body; the gradual narrowing and reshaping of form that results in the great, flattened fan of its tail.
With the ocean piled high and deep, drawn up over it, the whale sleeps. Adrift. Blissful. Content.
Soundlessly, the battleship materializes. It is not there; and then – in the next breath, thought, heartbeat – it simply is. Dull gray; wedged front; a single, monolith turret at its center. Obscene in length, the ship hovers – airborne – above the rippled ocean, casts its shadow down and through the sea, over the sleeping whale.
A moment, only, before it descends.
The ship’s keel parts the waves. Its hull flattens the ocean’s surface, sends sheets of water arching, waves thundering seismically away. Immediately, the battleship is swallowed whole and sinks rapidly, crushingly down. A herculean depth charge aimed directly at the creature beneath it.
Impossible, improbable, infuriating silence as the ship gathers downward speed.
Collision is assured.
The whale sleeps.
Unaware.
— C.Birde, 12/17
Moonwise — An Image
Like dreams
and mad schemes,
the Moon remains
out of reach —
gliding, grinning,
swollen with
knowing.
— C.Birde, 12/17
Residue — A Poem
I gave my cares
to the earth,
to the tumbled soil;
my fears
to the wind’s knife edge;
and my tears
to the rivers and
spreading sea.
A thudding grief
expelled
in howl and echo.
I came undone.
Nothing remained
but time and space,
and the residue
of flint-hard hope
to begin
again.
— C.Birde, 12/17
Improbably Deer — A Dream
A mere twelve inches at the shoulder, fourteen inches in length from chest to tail, it is the smallest of white-tailed deer. And so young – its tawny coat is sprinkled with white dots. It stands on impossibly slender legs. With a flick and flash of its tail, it gathers together its tiny hooves to leap and prance and dart about. For sheer joy, it cuts reckless, random patterns through the swaying meadow, beneath the dividing shade of towering trees.
At last, it pauses – gawky legs spread and anchored, tail raised, ears alert – an arm’s length away. Reach out to stroke it, to feel the silken fur stretched over that delicate structure of bones; to feel the small knob of skull, that firm reassurance crowned in large, fur-fringed ears.
Away. Away.
Fleet as forethought, the fawn leaps beyond reach, dashes in mad circles through wind-blown grasses. Scissoring through wildflowers, it cuts back and forth in indecipherable movements. Upon reaching the base of a great, thick oak, the deerling whisks up the tree’s grooved trunk. Tiny hooves serve as pitons fitted to the bark’s cracks and fissures.
Hand’s edge raised to shield your eyes, lean back, squint to follow its wild movement. Spy a flash of auburn within the canopy overhead. Hear the scrabble of its hooves against trunk and branches. Catch the sift and fall of loosened bark against your upturned cheeks, chin, lips. Feel a fist-solid pressure rise beneath your breastbone.
Lost.
— C.Birde, 12/17